translation of User Manuals

[Mosey]

I had a delightful flight to France some years ago, sitting and chatting with a charming young French engineer about similarities and differences between our languages, French and English. My French was poor, but his English was not much better, OK, but not great. He told me that his job was translating the shop manuals for Renault into English for the American publisher.   

[fcheslop]

That sounds about right having owned one to many Renaults
Reminds me of a Korean solder bath machine the front cover and index were in english and all the rest in Korean

[Walsheng]

In a hotel I stayed at in China:

[Bluechip]

Not W H Smith then ???

[Goldstar31]

Of course, this inability for the French  to write English is an urban myth.
Whilst our son was doing his year in La Belle France in Bescancon in the Jura we bought him a Renault Twingo to enable him to trip down to the Savoie to our 'appartement' overlooking Bourg St Maurice and l'Isere.
Oddly, I have a friend who was the Professor of English for ALL the teachers of English and JC and I shared many interests in doing up everything from Deux Chevaux to Hotchkiss and De Lahaye's.
It's an urban myth.  11 years ago my wife and I did what became the finale of the Italian Job on black ice over l'Isere and my wife ended up in the local hopital. Pas de Probleme. She got Cote du Rhone with every meal, I ended up with other Mountain Rescue friends.

I still have my 'Tele Peage' account on my Audi for the autoroutes. I still go under La Manche and into France. Stay the night in Bethune, go onto Haguenau and across the Rhine and on into Germany and then Austria..

In a few days time my son will go into 'Les Landes' presumably to buy another house. Bonne Chance- la bas?

Years ago, a mate of mine and myself  did 'the Monte' , I've canoed 'Sous le Pont D'Avignon', I have sailed and dived with 'Les Grenouiles'.

They haven't got Two heads or some 'sinistre' As for their ability to speak and write English, their business English is comparable with 'other foreigners'

[Buster]

I worked in France for a good few years, what was wierd was their insistence on speaking French for business use all day except when we went for breaks, lunch or drinks when everyone spoke English, company was international import/export and it was normal for people to speak half a dozen languages

I did spend an interesting evening explaining to the guys I worked with that as I was English I could never be a foreigner no matter what country I was in and that any Englishmen would consider them to be foreigners even when in France

Worked at a Château for a while and introduced the concept of "tea breaks" which they thought were a great idea

[Mosey]

I am not suggesting that my French cousins cannot write in English, only that the source of some of the amusing parts of shop manuals is the use of non-native speakers to write them. Vive la France!
Mosey

[Dan Rowe]

The English manual for one of the ships Daihatsu diesel generators gave instructions to start the engine from the control room. It read something like this:

"Pull out start switch and turn to the right, hold until the engine explodes."

I never had one explode.

Dan